Both you and the much younger player are easily discernible from bots to the human eye. I'm sure neither you nor the younger player crawl along a cliff edge because you're trying to run up it with a laser-beam focus on an enemy in an unreachable position.u

If your theory is true, and ArenaNet did more than sucker cheaters into cheating in an effort to sniff them out within the first week before they could do real harm, I'd still be remiss that they withdrew the permabans.

And I am absolutely no one's alt account. Google up "Alpha Lackey", you'll find a long series of articles written about Magic: the Gathering where my opinions on cheaters in that game ("I didn't know stacking my deck was cheating!") are pretty much entirely consistent with my views on cheaters and exploiters in this game. Everyone has to make their first post sometime, right?

You are to be commended for having learned a lesson from this. If you got 55 hours in within the first week, I have no doubt you'll be back where you were before you know it. Especially since you now know a thing or two about the game.

It's only "permanent" in the sense that their account is gone. They've lost one week of progress and face a $70 fine if they really want to play again. Sounds like more than fair punishment for cheating. And let's not say who's accusing who of spinning or turning a fact around by calling it anything but what it is.

On the contrary, I think the cheers and adulation from the 970,000 non cheaters they have are more indicative than the whining of the 3,000 cheaters caught with their hands in the cookie jar, even if the latter ARE louder than the former.

After completing the first public quest, I noticed that around 30 karma got you an apple or a Crude Salvage Kit. I suspect this was the case for 100% of the players professing innocence. How, then, can "legendary weapon for 21 karma" not set off alarms? "Level 60 yellow-level rare.. costs less than a piece of fruit.. it can't POSSIBLY be an error, time to buy thousands of them".

ArenaNet, you have my full respect for being transparent, for wading through the muck and for calling out these lying reprobates on their own terms.